Archive for the ‘Dalian American International School’ Category

China surely is the champion of what is and what is not and perceptions mashed together to morph into possibly acceptable perceptions, but not really. Reality is a mistaken illusion – it always has been; look at religion, personal-relationships and politics and education…. Maybe it is best not to look to see but to look to enjoy – surely not to look to ponder or philosophize, that would be akin to giving accreditation to what is really all just for fun. Do not take what you perceive to be real as truth, just enjoy. This is China – I tell myself that often – just as I would tell myself that in those psychedelic moments of the 1960s, or in my Tarot Card readings and mystical belief system of the 1970s and astrological interpretations of events/thoughts/life for some 40 years before waking up one day and saying ‘this is bullshit’. Perception is just how we colour reality in front of us. To me China and the 1960s have similarity in their un-realness. The moment is just about fun, to enjoy, to build memories for future moments when life returns to boring, which from my experience it always does.

A week from today school is over and we are preparing to travel to New York, Atlanta, Malaysia, Australia but today is a holiday; Dragon Boat Festival. Duān wǔ jié happens on the 5th day of the 5th month of the lunar calendar and believe it or not I did not get a pop up message on my phone, ipad, computer; not from Google Calendar – which boldly proclaimed ‘you have no new events’ – surely it could have said ‘go back to bed it is a holiday’ but no – no reminders or messages to tell me of this glorious event. And to contribute to all those bloody fives I was wide awake at five AM demanding of my unwilling mind to go back to sleep because this is a holiday.

According to Chinese custom folks race boats, eat Zongzi, and drink wine – pretty much like an Aussie Barbie celebration for anything.

Then last night we were watching that most stupid of series (that everyone else is ranting and raving about how it is the best series of all time; what??!!!) ‘Game of Thrones’ and that idiotic Southern California blonde chick started season two or is it three – it is so mindless that I am always updating my web-pages during it and forget where in the story we are – she goes and gives birth to dragons. Good golly how could anyone like this? Narda says we should just watch it for a while because everyone is ranting and raving that it is the best series of all time and maybe at some point we may like it or at least understand what is going on. She said that about Dexter too. All that blood. We watched the whole bloody thing – to give realism to that Australian/Pommie saying – but of course I was updating my web-pages during all of that but at least it was easy to follow – just find a baddie and kill him.

From an email to staff at our school about today from our Mandarin teacher:

‘This Festival is to commemorate an upright minister called Qu Yuan. He was an excellent poet and literati as well in 300BC, the end of the Spring and Autumn Dynasty. To protect the country, Qu Yuan advised many suggestions to his emperor. While the emperor was irritated and Qu Yuan was put into a river and drowned. People were sad and took boats to save Qu Yuan, and meanwhile they wrapped zong zi and throwed into river, avoidding fishes eating Qu Yuan’s body.

Until today Chinese people retain the traditions. First zong zi was made by sticky rice only, and gradually zong zi has different types like meat inside, peanut inside. I like the very first type– with rice only–and dip some sugar on it.’

When we were asked to sign up for a celebration of all of this last Sunday we were informed that only 20 could go and a bus would take us to the Tong li Gong Palace in Kaifaqu. Of course I was excited being the academic tourist that I am. I quickly sent an email to reserve seats for Narda and I. I could barely restrain myself from running down to her room to share this wonderful news that not only had I registered for us to go but we were accepted on the bus that would only take 20 of us most chosen to this glorious event. Well she was a bit less than thrilled and wanted to know why I would want to go and hear some children singing songs. Now perhaps I had a misconception as normally I do of the reality of the event. Dragon Boat Festival? Well it sounded really great to me. I had no idea it could be anything else. Narda said that the Tong li Gong Palace was not a palace but was the women and children’s centre of Jinzhouixinqu. Damn! She had taken a first grade class there to sing earlier in the year and it is where the owner of Dalian American International School has a language school which many of our teachers work at in their spare time – though being a teacher at this school I am not sure when there is spare time.

At another time in my life I would have been disappointed but at my age everything tends to be so unlike I thought it would be at the start that I have become immune to concepts of disappointment. I suppose I would be surprised if anything in my life turned out to be how I imagined it to be at the start of the process of adventure that I had hurdled myself at before crashing into a wall of reality.

The big day arrived – last Sunday, and dragging a complaining Narda to the lobby to mingle with the assumed 20 teachers who were quick enough to sign up before the bus was full we were greeted by the other three teachers who signed up to go. We ended up going in two cars instead of a bus load of chirping, happy, Dragon Festival celebrating mates. I like the entrance to Tong li Gong Palace which of course by now I had realized was not a palace but as all things in China are – just a misconstrued notion of what a palace would be if it was a four floor office building. And yes that is a huge construct of a mother and child on top of the building – giving away any illusion that it could be anything else. Not sure when angels arrived on the Chinese mindset but there they are, western looking cherubs up there with a not very Chinese looking mother. Welcome to China where we are not quite sure of our icons or what we should believe in.

Entrance to the ‘Tong li Gong Palace’ in Kaifaqu, Dalian Development Area, China

And as luck would have it – there is a YouTube clip of this wonderful event at http://youtu.be/KO8GHLMuKFQ – another one of those ‘gone- viral’ extremely-sought-after video clips; wait that is my illusion – now three days later – there has been one hit to it. I think that was me looking at it on another computer. But to save my two or three readers who no doubt have had a gut-full and have stopped reading by now, the thrill or agony of watching yet another one of my five-hundred plus video clips I will simply say yes some children sang, a grop danced; but that is not all. We made zong zi – a sticky rice, bean paste, red date in banana wrap thingy. However, I was a total failure and after being tutored by a patient local gal with great wrapping skills who patiently showed me over and over how to fold the stupid things quit – or I quit – here is a photo of me trying this – of course the YouTube video at http://youtu.be/KO8GHLMuKFQ shows this even better.

making zong zi

The other highlight – other being second to me making zong zi, was this traditional paint dude who we were told is famous. OK I have thousands of web pages and more than five-hundred videos on line – I bet he has not done that – anyway, all those pesky planets I have in Leo constantly get in my story-line; this painter dude made a great ink drawing. I think we are taking a course with him in the fall so that will be groovy. He did this calligraphy & Chinese zither in about ten minutes. You can see this in the video at http://youtu.be/KO8GHLMuKFQ.

To quote some stuff from the program list of what we saw:

Children poetry chanting: “the new san zi jing” – always a thrill to watch

Children game: ”ding ji dan” (hitting eggs with others – in this game children bash each other’s boiled duck egg and the first egg to crack is the loser – good grief)

Prize-awarding ceremonies – this is where the Zongzi making ladies were awarded for their making of Zongzi and unfortunately my instructor was in the third place category which could give credence to my belief that it was not really my fault for being such a dismal failure at making Zongzi but that I lacked proper instruction.

It is two days ago, Monday that I started off talking about but having woken at five AM – it is now after 8 and Narda is still happily sleeping the holiday away and I am fading I drifted off about what today’s holiday actually was for – a dragon boat festival but as we are on the sea and not on a proper lake or river there are no races.

calligraphy & Chinese zither

Monday, we, well Narda did not go as elementary stayed at school and sang or rolled about or whatever elementary children do, took the middle school and high school children to Discoveryland (大连发现王国). Discoveryland is our province’s concept of what Disneyland would be if created by Chinese. Yes I have a YouTube video at http://youtu.be/lOoeM46fwl0, and yes I do a lot of work not only at school but at home for school – I just fit in my own personal crap early in the morning or while watching riveting TV shit-shows like Game of Thrones. This is my early morning holiday last posting probably before flying off to New York next week.

entrance to Discoveryland

We were doing one of those amazing race races. I do not agree with children doing a learning project for hours before having time to play on their own. They pay their own fee in to the amusement park, 100 RMB (about $15 US) – which is cheap compared to the States and to have to do work for hours is nuts. This year we teachers each had a station with an exercise for the students to do – my event was to take a photo of a one-perspective and a two-perspective line up of the children. We all have an advise group and I have 10 middle school children in mine. So my advise group started off at my station which was an OK place as it was beneath a building providing some shade. After my event they draw a card to see where the next exercise is and go off to that. The important part is that they work together and stay together and do the exercise. Well after ten minutes two of my girls come back and want to rent a scooter to go around from event to event. Of course I said no as one of the rules is not to run to the next event or lost ten-points. We did not make a rule that children could not rent a scooter to go from event to event because who would allow such a thing? So the girls run off to the principal and ask and he says yes they can so they do. That was the end of my advise group’s cohesion and after a couple of hours the other children in my group came back and said they could not do the events because they could not find the girls roaring around on their scooter so I dismissed them and said go have fun.

Frank had it more difficult as his station was on a bridge with no shade and there he stood for hours in the hot sun.

Discoveryland

As it is Dragon Boat festival week holiday the place was crowded – not sure why we would go on a holiday and not a week earlier but such is life. Lines to rides were four hours long instead of the usual two. Only a few children went on a ride – for the most part they wandered around in the afternoon and the ones I saw did not seem that happy. I took lots of photos of our students as I do to put on the TV screen in the window of my computer lab and to have footage for my twice weekly in-house TV show that I do with my film class so I was entertained. My favourite part is their Discoveryland Parade. As tacky as any such thing would be this is especially strange as they have mostly non-Chinese in the parade. Most of the participants are youthful Russians. The Egyptian group consisted of very camp males in their twenties dressed in gold skirts and gold plastic to look like metal tops dancing as if they were the Village People doing WMCA. On top of the floats were youthful females with few clothes on wiggling about.

I got a lot of short clips that I can use as backgrounds as my film class has gone blue-screen crazy.

Narda said she just wanted to gig for her birthday so here at Campus village cafe at Dalian American International School that is what she did

The best of living in Campus Village, assisted living, as we call it is that our little community tags along together. Last night we went out to the Discoveryland Hotel for beer and food – the people are great – the ones we work with – the beer was what it is in China but the food was crap. I struggled to find a vegetarian dish and that ended up being tofu with fish – so that concept got lost in the translation. For Narda’s birthday a dozen or so old people came to our flat for din din – we made up a good vegetarian lasagna and some other stuff. Everyone seemed happy – a few murmurs about ‘oh no no meat’ but that is the way it is in my kitchen. We went the three-floors down to Campus Café and Narda with the others were happy, sounding great and entertained us and the other twenty – thirty folks. It was by far her best birthday in the past 13 years since we left Australia. Being early June – the problem with Gemini – we have not been around her family in so long. But with our community and with a microphone and good musicianship her birthday came to life.

the Black Pebbles live at Campus Cafe at Dalian American International School

The Black Pebbles live at Campus Cafa Dalian American International School

It is so fundamental but the loo can so govern the day, especially in China. (Loo being Australian/British and etc. for toilet: (From Wikipedia: “When people flung their potty waste out of the window, they would shout “Gardez l’eau” [gar-day low]. That’s French for “watch out for the water”. We probably get the word “loo” from this expression, although some people think it comes from “Room 100” which is what European people used to call the bathroom.” “The word appears to originate no earlier than James Joyce’s usage in Ulysses in 1922 — “O yes, mon loup. How much cost? Waterloo. water closet.” — perhaps Joyce came up with it.”)

My favorite is at the Shangrali in Shanghai with a remote control for many functions; spray water, various forms of heat and many buttons that I did not try. The loo at the Vutup Dentist Clinic at the Shangrali Hotel Dalian is a treat. As soon as the door is open the seat pops up, it is warm and it too has buttons. I have yet to be game to push them but Narda tried one and it gave her a bit of a spray wash – she did not try the other buttons. OK the picture does not give much of the pleasure of use but compared to the usual toilets in China, even at the ultra- modern new Dalian North Railroad station, it is a real find. I hate squat toilets and in my two years here have not used one except to pee. Anything else waits until I get home or find a western hotel. Last week a woman’s baby got flushed down one (http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/chinese-baby-flushed-down-toilet-1923771) and survived. I always thought that someday I should have therapy about the fact I was put in an orphanage and taken out three times then finally adopted by some mad-cap Christians in 1950 but this person is going to really need therapy. Narda has the technique down – the squatting part and does not mind too much. She

Chinese squat toilet

has demonstrated to whomever is interested – not in real-action, but showing us a good squat position to make things move along. The worst toilets are in the Jinshitan Market where, if one can get past the smells, even the women just squat along a wall with an open trough. Narda, a user of said trough, could not understand the gestures of a woman squatting next to her one time. She kept point a finger in the air – not the finger but a finger – this is China where people are not as rude as us Westerners. Then Narda realised the woman was telling her to put her bag on a hook on the wall so it would not touch the foul floor.

Toilets in Holland I find difficult too, and though they are proper sit-down toilets the drain is placed in the front so everything sits not in water but on the base, stinking up the room until flushed.

dutch-toilet

I suppose if one watched heaps of ER shows, or Grey’s Anatomy and had an interest in what their deposits in the loo looked like they could easily observe it in a Dutch toilet.

Not sure how I got onto this topic when there was so much other I wanted to note to remember the past two weeks, but at one am I was so wide awake and it being
Saturday night well actually Sunday morning I thought I would write a bit then go back to bed. It is now three AM and my concern is that I will be sleepy for Sunday which I suppose is fine as all we will do is shop at the local Longshawn Village for veggies and tofu for the week. Couple with the fact that I have taken photos of loos for some odd reason – maybe just to appreciate what a proper one with heat, spray and the what-not incorporated within. I think adding music would be good – something classical – though hip-hop could be OK. Even country and western would be fine – they are always talking about loss. Then there are the blues, surely we could have some really good B King tunes play when we sat and shat. The one at the Vutup Clinic is adequate though. As soon as the door is open the seat cover pops up and when you leave it goes back down. It does not differentiate between male or female so the seat ring thing is still down and needs to be lifted for the male release thing.

It is three am so I will try once again to go to sleep. I had already lain awake for an hour before getting up at one am. My mind is so active. Not sure why. School is full-on, we leave for the summer in two and a half weeks for the States a couple of weeks then Australia for four weeks and a side trip to Malaysia so it is all pretty chilled and no reason not to sleep. I tried to contact the inner Self and find peace and solace using techniques I learned back in the 1970s when I was a brother in the Holy Order of Mans but they did not work and I question these past few years whether all what I once believed in whilst in my decade long metaphysical stupor was real or are we just caught up in evolution’s game being nothing more than the ones who prepare the next generation who will do the same and within all that the species evolves toward something or the other?

Yesterday we went into Dalian on the 轻轨, qing gui (light rail), thinking by leaving at 8:30 we would get a seat in but no luck it is always so crowded. Out of boredom I wrote down all the stations on line 3 – speaking of threes – most of the stations are broken into three words on the signs though in reality, my reality, they are really one word: Jin Shi Tan, Xiao Yao Wan (the stop for the future city, Wolong Bay, that is being built – see my youtube video from last year at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-drgVo45WWs) DD Port, Bao Shu Qui,

stations on line 3

Kai Fai Qu (5 colur city see my clip of Kaifaiqu http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAz3eqFzfRg), Jim Ma Li, Da Lian Wan (in the Ganjingzi District of Dalian City), Hou Yan, Auan Shui (markets), Jin Jai Jie, Xiang Lu Jiao (Metro, Sams Club, Decathlon sports store – 迪卡侬(香炉礁店, Ikea) and finally stopping at the last stop – Dalian Station. The school’s shopping bus stops at Metro where we fill boxes and suitcases of what we need for a month then put it on the bus and go off for the day. The bus driver unloads our crap back at Campus Village and we collect it whenever we drag our sorry asses back home.

, about a 45 minute ride, Narda managed to rush onto the train at the Dalian Station

On the qing gui home

and get a seat. I was fast but when a hundred Chinese are going for a couple of dozen seats it is the really quick who get a seat and I was left standing to analyze my poor strategy for getting a seat. Never the one to shy away from strangers I saw Narda and the girl next to her passing the girl’s cell phone back and forth. They did this all the way to the Kai Fai Qu station where suddenly Narda moved over giving me a space to sit. They were using the phone to carry on a conversation with both translating back and forth and the topic of discussion was that when the girl got off I would have a seat. At the start of their ‘conversation’ the girl wrote that Narda could help her with learning English. This is what is so enjoyable about living here; people will find a way to communicate whether they share a common language or not.

Last weekend Narda’s sister, Carolin and her husband Michael stopped in for a couple of days. They are celebrating being fifty and are on the way to Holland, England, France and places like that. On Saturday evening we went into Dalian on the light rail – kuai-gui to stay overnight at the Harbour View Hotel and we went to see the Beijing Beatles on the rooftop at the Lenbach German Restaurant ( Xinghai Square). They

the Beijing Beatles live in Dalian

were sponsored by the International Club of Dalian. I have a short video clip at http://youtu.be/WzsnK6uUQx8 without watching the clip let it suffice to say they were quite terrible sounding. Narda had just done a Beatles concert a few days earlier with her elementary children and they were much better. A couple of Narda’s fourth/fifth graders were at the gig and they went on stage and told the Beijing Beatles who by the way are from Australian and great Britain – that they sang the wrong words for Yellow Submarine. The children would know that one as they sand it for weeks before their concert. I heard them daily as my video-film studio at Dalian American International School is next door to Narda’s music room. A lot of my little video shows I do twice weekly with my students for the school to play has her children singing off in the background because of our thin walls. There were a lot of expats at the show – many from our school and it was enjoyable no matter the fact that they were not in harmony, missed lyrics, and were just generally horrible. They have a website which make them sound good http://thebeijingbeatles.com/ but in reality – think of a college piss-up where everyone knows the lyrics because it is the Beatles and there is a lot of drinking going on and no one really cares how bad the band sounds because it is so easy to sing along.

We have two weeks left of work then we are off to the States (NYC, upstate New York, and Atlanta), Malaysia, and Australia then back at the start of August. As usual life is hectic at school with so many things to deal with. In my little world things are great with my film class and our setting up a film program and studio. We have been going nuts with blue screens and having lots of interesting backgrounds. I am still looking for a proper professional camera for next school year with little luck. I will probably have to wait until Australia to get one. It has been an amazing year for me both as technology integration coordinator as we move toward a one-to-one device program. It is a challenge with so many devices and operating systems. Back at Albany Academy when I was the Director of Technology it was straight forward, we all used macs and that was it. In my video production class thanks to an Intel grant we are getting set up well and coming with good products, looking forward to next school year.

In my little self-centred world I have been creating web pages since the early 1990s when the World Wide Web was first invented. I have created thousands of pages and have many domains as any self-serving Leo would: neuage.org, http://neuage.me, neuage.mobi, neuage.us, neuage.info, to name just a few. Last week I put a tracker-cookie on 590 pages (about ten percent of my pages) so I could have a better idea of where people go so I could improve and change them to more mobile friendly and perhaps start creating neuage apps for my tofu pages or my picture poems, children stories, many blogs and etc. I thought it would give me a good idea of where the masses are flocking to. As a night-mare on Leo Street would have it after three days I had one hit to one page out of 590. I think I could be in a record book for having the fewest visits to the most created pages on the web. Narda does not understand why I would care if anyone visited any of my webpages but she is a Gemini so I understand her confusion. I have Mars conjunct Uranus in Gemini so I do have a little bit of non-Leo in my makeup and I know that part of me; Mars and Uranus confuse me often as well as those around me.

When Narda’s sister and brother-in-law were here last weekend we went to the

Just another weekend in China though with a different set of events/thoughts/wanderings….

Chinese Visa Office

11th Annual Dalian International Walking Festival

Soggy day

‘Famous French and English Bands’ at the Chateau du Vin Bordeaux

Beatles concerts

And so much more

Actually this is more than a weekend memory of what-we-did as Thursday and Friday is just as much of this extended weekend at least in my memory as Saturday and Sunday is. Of course Thursday and Friday were work days. With my job as technology coordinator however I am always on the job as I read technology and educational blogs and updates whether I am at school or on the shopping bus, sitting on the loo or waiting in a dentist’s office. Saturday whilst Narda was in the dentist chair for more than an hour I took enough notes from what I had found to be potentially useful stuff for possible integration or to-try at school that I will be spending days engaging with it. There are so many blogging-filming apps now that I am looking forward to what I can do with my classes next year that are specializing in multimedia, and film specifically. This is an exciting time to be developing a film program in a school. Helping students to become always-journalist will be one of the most important lessons for them. Journalism has not changed but the delivery and sharing has. When I was doing my journalism degree at the start of the 1990s I concentrated on radio-broadcasting, helping to start the community radio station E-FM (Encounter FM) in Victor Harbor, South Australia. My part of the radio station needless to say was news and children’s radio (CAR = Children’s Australian Radio – my little contribution to Australian community radio) where my children managed to star on.

I am teaching broadcast journalism along with filming. Merging these with social sites and story development and sharing more than ‘we had pizza last night’ will greatly assist students. I am having them blogging using their phones as well as filming and bringing it into the classroom for editing. Next year I will collaborate with the English department (write the story), music department for backing tracks as well as my classes for filming and editing.

The next big shift in schools is from integrating technology to integrating film in every department. Students are already doing this in their life outside of school putting clips onto whatever site is their favorite at the moment. Students are self-branding all the time and assisting as well as providing time and space to do this will improve their self-image i.e. self-brand. We have been putting a lot of emphasis on student portfolios lately but social sites are there real portfolios and I feel that is the area we need to develop. Employers are looking at social sites as part of their investigations of potential new hires and if the social site has wonderfully crafted video-blogs and short films this becomes a living-portfolio. This area has not been very well addressed and it is an area I will be working on next year so students will have their shared-online-lives crafted to look like mini-film-festival. ‘The Festival of Me’ – it sounds so Leo and having five planets in Leo I feel qualified for such a category of instruction or for at least me. In my middle school publication class I have students making a magazine in InDesign titled ‘About Me’ where they create a whole newsletter/e-zine about themselves. Their initial reaction is that writing more than fifty words about themselves is impossible becomes more engaging when they write about their favorite video game or movie and get to insert photos (Creative Commons only of course) and interview each other and write up a commercial and on and on.

We have been corresponding with a school in India to do a collaborative on-line real-time film project and we have the assistance of a film producer in Los Angeles who recently had her film accepted into the Sundance film festival in Utah. Our class has been Skypping her and we have been discussing their individual projects for this quarter as she ‘looks over our shoulders’. My neighbor, Frank, and his wife are moving to Yangon, Myanmar to teach at an international school next year. We have been putting together a plan to do a collaborative film project which in my little world is quite exciting. I am thinking of his and my students writing a script together – back and forth then having our individual classes create and edit the script and have them playing side by side as one film with two interpretations of the same story. His students are mostly Myanmar citizens and mine are a collection from around the planet which would make this a very global endeavor.

To emphasize my integration of film in the student’s life where most of their daily short clips are posted to social sites from their smartphones..

An Australian filmmaker has won first prize at the Sundance London Film and Music Festival with a short film shot entirely on a Nokia Lumia 920 smartphone. The film explores the influence of hip hop, which started in the Bronx, on the indigenous communities in regional Australia and how it helped youth reconnect with tribal elders and tell stories using this style of music.

Last Thursday it was Narda’s elementary student concert, ‘All you need is love’ that put us into a Beatles mood. She has been doing a lot of work on this for the past months and I have been filming little segments as commercials for our school’s video-news show, DAISlive. As Narda’s biggest fan the past twelve years I would say this was up there with her best work. Of course it is not the same as when she did a Beatles tribute at Albany Academy in upstate New York a decade ago but that was with high school and there was dance involved as Albany Academy for Girls has a strong dance program. Being in a Beatles mood we are off to see the Beijing Beatles next weekend who are playing in Dalian. Carolyn, Narda’s sister and her husband are visiting from Australia then so they can too see what China has to offer to the musical past. One of the Beijing Beatles is from Australia so they couldn’t be that bad. The name of the show is We do like to be beside the seaside – tour to Dalian.

Friday we needed to collect our passports so we could go to the U.S. Consulate in Shenyang this coming Tuesday. Narda has to sort out some stuff with the Yanks and I have to go along being the Yank of a sponsor. As always these things are so complicated; whether to keep a Green Card – problem is being out of the States for the past two years, surrendering it is an issue and becoming a citizen is another kettle of fish. We just hope to be able to sort it out in one trip. With less than four weeks before we leave for the States she is now in no-man’s land. They won’t give her a visitor’s visa without tossing the Green Card and she may not be unable to renew the Green Card and now with the recent Boston problems the Yanks are all the more tighter about stuff. When we first went to the States in 2002, shortly after 9-11, we had a terrible time. According to many phone calls we had everything in order. When we arrived in Sydney – with our flight booked for the next day to New York, not only were they very rude to us but they said in the photos of Narda her ear was not showing enough and we would have to re-do the photo and come back in a week. At the time we were homeless, having sold Narda’s home in Adelaide, and storing away all our belongings we were left to cancel our flight with no idea when we would be able to get Narda with a visia. We were not going for a usual visit, we were moving there. I had been out of the country for 20-years so they said something about not having domicile and as a sponsor of Narda who, like me, had jobs in the States; she was at Albany Academy for Girls and me at the State University of New York at Albany, and my father was 97 years old waiting to see me before he left the planet. After three days of abuse by the wankers at the US consulate in Sydney I contacted my cousin Fredrick Miller who knew Congressman Sweeney and Sweeney sent a congressional letter to the consulate in Sydney. All of a sudden they were nice to me, and said I could come in right away and we could fly out in the evening. There was a period we thought we would never get in to the States. Now after living there for more than a decade, owning three homes and Narda having a son living in the States married to a Yank (I started the trend in her family of marrying non-Dutch people). Before I came bopping along Narda and her three sisters and all their relatives had only ever married Dutch people, having migrated to Australia from the Netherlands in the 1950s. Since me one son has married a Yank and lives in Atlanta, Georgia and another son has married a POM – prisoner of Mother England, and her third son now in India, has a pommie girlfriend too so I changed their directions. They had all been staying in the Dutch genetic pool for five-hundred plus years; so they must be thankful to me. To make a too long story short about going to New York my father hung around for another five years and we were happy that Sweeney was able to get us in. Fortunately for us this was before Sweeney got into a bit of trouble: In September 2006, the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington(CREW) released its ‘The 20 Most Corrupt Members of Congress’ and Sweeney was one of the 20.

Our visit to the Chinese visa issuing place was much different than the one to Sydney. We had one of those Chinese moments where everything takes longer and goes slow compared to what us Westerns want but after a couple of hours, chatting about stuff like the price of wine in Australia and how many children we had and lots of smiles and interpretations we got our passports with our official work-visa to July 31st 2014. Being past 65 this is a big deal for me as in most provinces the work-visa limit is 60. I believe from our conversation at the visa office that Chinese retirement is 60 then I think they get a pension which puts away the thought that china does not look after their people.

What we are finding is that a lot of stuff we have been told in the Western media is quite different than the China we see on a day-to-day basis. People; whether authorities or folks in the street are really quite friendly. They stop and stare like we are from another galaxy but with five planets in Leo it does not bother me. They are generally a very curious lot and want to know about Westerns. We are curious too; and of course I am very curious about their fascination with all things French as I will show in a moment.

Saturday was the big 11th Annual Dalian International Walking Festival. We signed up before realizing we had a dentist appointment at 11 AM. We figured we would walk for an hour then catch a cab into town. As things would have it, in a town that does not see much rain fall, all day Saturday it rained. I put on my waterproof ‘Tommy Hilfiger’ trendy coat (even old people like to look stylish) and we took the school van in a dozen or so other ‘walkers’ from school.

Tommy Hilfiger’ rain coat

There were a lot of people, like many thousands, all with their umbrellas up headed out on the 5 – 30 kilometer walk going along the Coastal Road, “Bin Hai Road”. We had intended to do just the first five. Actually we did the first few blocks then disappeared up a side street and caught a cab to the dentist.

At the start of the race is Dalian Castle Hotel, a 6-star hotel (300 rooms) due to open December 1, 2013.

Dalian Castle Hotel

It overlooks Xinghai Bay, 星海广场 and of course a million or so walkers in May, rain or shine.

Of course it is the statue in front that I find even more interesting than a walled castle being constructed in the midst of a city;

Definitely my kind of hotel if I could afford a six-star hotel, I did not even know they had such a ranking.

After the dentist we took the light rail (轻轨, qing gui)to Kaifaqu. Normally we take the shopping bus and get our groceries but we missed the bus. Harbor Deli is one of our stops as it is near the Kaifaqu qing gui station which is the Five Colour City stop and they have Western crap; cheese, cereal and that which we cannot otherwise find. Of course the rain was ever present as we took a bus (for one RMB = 15 cents US) instead of walking to the green-door – not the name of the place but we have no idea what the sign says – and loaded ourselves down for the week.

We figured we would take a cab home but after a couple of cabbies said no and another said two-hundred RMB (30 bucks) we realized the only way home for us was to call Jack – our regular driver who came and collected us and took us for 70 RMB – about 1/3 the cost of a taxi. Of course it was not Jack himself but one of his mates – we call them all Jack. If this was Australia we would just add an o to the end as Australian’s do and call him Jacko but we don’t and we won’t.

We were so exhausted by the time Jack came as will as wet we were ready to go to sleep on the sidewalk. This is one of the most difficult things with living at Campus Village; the transportation is almost too difficult. This is the second time we spent an exhausting Saturday and got ourselves stuck. If there is a lesson we are not learning it except that we should stop shopping anywhere but our local Long Shan Village.

We received the invite; ‘Famous French and English Bands’ at the Chateau du Vin Bordeaux in our school email. Chateau du Vin Bordeaux, which was called, last year, Chateau De Bourdeux, across the street from us – I can see it from my balcony. (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTioCA7Ct44&feature=share&list=UUzGrI_yggI56Gpp2ZyNQAXw, a year ago) has been another castle dreaming of France but this one you can live at as they are The Dalian Haichang Group is building 400 luxury villas in this style. We toured the place last year and when we asked why they had not sold any we were told because they were too expensive, like a million dollars plus. The Haichang Group have been purchasing lots of chateauxs in France – see The Chinese Chateaux In Bordeaux for the down-and-dirty. Of course we are hoping this will mean cheap French wine locally.

Some of my images for this afternoon visit to almost France – China style.

The first one is a view of our apartment from the local million dollars plus flat.

Chateau De Bourdeux

Chateau De Bourdeux

china likes putting these kinds of ships around the place – this is a view from Chateau De Bourdeux

Dinner seemed fine, just scrambled eggs with a bit of cheese and hash brown potatoes. But a few minutes later I was sicker than ever in my life. Narda was OK so we ruled out food poisoning but after getting rid of dinner and all else before and getting worse by the minute Narda insisted on calling for help. This is not calling a hospital in the States or Australia which would have had Narda driving me to a hospital then me sitting in a waiting room for a long period as the world continued to swim around me and I did not know if I would survive another moment. Living here is what some would call a third-world spot; though China would not agree. I know we always say we do not want to end up in a Chinese hospital. But we had no worry of that.

I managed to say a few times that I would be OK – surely one more vomit and one more laying on the bathroom floor as I held on from blacking out then I would be fine. After the nagging wife said for too many times she should be calling for help I mumbled just call to see what they would say. Of course telling a wife such a thing is a green-light, open-door, the horse-has-bolted, thing to agree to.

We have the number for the SOS International medical emergency on our door. Narda rang telling my symptoms and some other medical stuff about me and a few minutes later our doctor said to meet him at the clinic in ten-minutes. Our doctor lives in our building though I do not know which apartment and the emergency routing service is through Beijing – off in the distance.

Again this is not the States or Australia where we are from. This is in a foreign country where only people around us speak English.

What is so unique is that we live in a community that has everything. The Dalian American International School with a large fence, gates, and guards 24-hours a day has more than a school within the compound. It has Campus Village, where we live, students live, and families working for Intel, Goodyear and the likes live. It also has a restaurant and most importantly a medical clinic. Last year we went to the clinic a few times for flu shots, occasional blood tests for some ongoing stuff and general checkups. It was only a few months ago that we saw there was more than the waiting room and a couple other rooms where doctors talked about their life in other countries in between prescribing medication. There were several other rooms for overnight patients and a whole little emergency room.

What is unique about this job is how our lives are so communal. At most schools people work together, sometimes go for a drink; when Narda was chair of the performing arts at Albany Academy in New York she would have her staff meetings at a local pub but aside of that most schools do not have such a community environment. Here I see the doctor at the gym or bike riding; I see kids at school, then at the Campus Café or on the shopping bus that trolls the highway between our compound and the nearest shopping areas half an hour away and on Saturday all the way into Dalian – more than an hour – where we go to Ikea, Metro or Sams Club to load up on crap. Parents are at the school, and then at the gym or swimming pool, at the café, doctor’s, chasing after their children on the school oval. Our actual living is a bit separated but in the same compound. We have the teachers wing – three stories of us, each with a different story to tell; the Chinese boarding students are in the same building but in a different wing with the boys on the third floor and girls on second; and administration, families and ‘important people’ living in larger flats in the next building and over and beyond that, yet still within the walls of our school area, are the townhouses that the expat employees live in. They are of course on a different pay scale than us and their children go to our school and they have drivers on call whenever they want to go someplace. We have drivers too but we have to pay them. Of course we are mere teachers and not movers and shakers at international companies.

And what is most interesting is our doctor who lives in the same wing as us; I think on the second floor – I have never been to his place. Doctors are on 24-hour duty and I think it is six weeks on and six weeks off duty. Our current doctor is from Ohio (I think) our other usual doctor is from South Africa. They belong to Doctors without Borders. They work in all sorts of environments and seem to have to know about everything as they are all we have to look after anything that can go wrong.

It was about 8:30 when Narda rang SOS-International in Beijing and they in turn rang our doctor who rang us and said to be at the clinic in ten-minutes. Our clinic is open 8 – 6 Monday to Friday and a bit on Saturday but of course in an emergency it is always open. Our current doctor, Steve, did lots of tests on me including an EKG (electrocardiogram) in between my staggering to the loo to vomit whatever was left which at this point was not much. Before long I was lying in bed in a room next to the emergency/operating room with an IV line in my arm and as the world spun a bit out of control I drifted off due to a combination of some heavy sleep inducing stuff and whatever other medication was being pumped in. As the clinic was closed Doctor Steve rang one of the nurses to come in and watch me throughout the night. When I was still conscious I felt bad about someone having to come in for the night when she was the day time nurse that day. Narda told me the next day that Doctor Steve slept in the room next to me with the door open instead of going back to his flat. During the night I was aware of the nurse checking me, taking blood pressure and checking the IV drip.

Narda came in a six in the morning and left a bowl of cereal and my soy milk. When I awoke at 8 I gave Narda the instructions to where my lesson plans for my classes were on the school drive so they could be passed on to whoever was taking my class.

At 8:30 the nurse took off the IV as I was feeling better and I wanted to go home – which in this case is taking the elevator up three floors. A nurse wanted to go with me in case I got dizzy but I insisted I was OK. I slept most of the day and today, Friday, I was back at school, though tired and weak it was good to know that I probably had some of the best care I could have had anywhere in the world.

Sometimes I think life was easier back in the States or in Australia (well not always; as a single parent for 20 years in Australia that was difficult) but I have never been in a place where a medical emergency was so quickly attended to.

Last summer Narda and I got hit from behind by a large truck on a four-lane highway in Mississippi at 70 mph and if it was not for the concrete blocks separating us from the oncoming traffic we would have been in a bit of a pickle but we just totaled the car and had shock but otherwise not injured. We waited for more than an hour that time in a very hot sun on a major freeway before the police arrived. If we had been injured we surely would not have been in an emergency room within fifteen minutes like here.

Of course if I had listened to Narda I would have been downstairs a couple of hours earlier and perhaps not have gotten myself into such an emergency state to begin with. Then again if I had not listened to her and decided to tough it out which was my notion then most likely I would not be writing this now.

To make a short story a tad bit longer; another amazing aspect of our close living together is everyone knows everything. Everyone I saw at school the next day, today, wanted to know how I was doing. The teacher next door heard me gagging and exploding in the bathroom so of course she wanted to know how I was.

And what happened? The doctor reckons it was a case of severe food poisoning. I ate the same as Narda for tea but for lunch we did not have the same thing. We usually come home and make a sandwich then go back to school unless I have lunch duty which I have twice every eight-day cycle. Lunch duty means eating with the kids downstairs in the café. But yesterday Narda stayed at school as she is doing heaps of extra work for the elementary concert; “All you need is love” a tribute to the Beatles, for next week. I went home and decided to have some pasta and to make a white sauce for it and as there was an open pack of milk in the fridge I used that instead of my usual soy milk. What we have sort of determined was that the long life milk was the culprit. Last Friday we had no electricity for about fifteen hours as I wrote about in the previous blog and stuff thawed out then re-froze; our long life milk packs we keep in the freezer. Then it could have been transit Mars in Taurus opposite Saturn in Scorpio making a T-square to my four planet conjunction in Leo (Venus, Saturn, Pluto and Sun and my Part of Fortune too all in my 10th house). Whatever it was life in China is good. We often say it is safer here than living in the States or Australia mostly because folks don’t walk around with guns.

Walking home from school Narda and I pass the clinic and there is our doctor leaning out the window asking how I am feeling. Where else does that happen?

I use to live in communes in the San Francisco area in the 1960s and this is not far removed from that where everyone works and lives and plays together. I would like to have a large communal garden but as we all go away for the summer it won’t work.

Quoting Jean, “We can’t lose you – you are our mascot”. Good golly what does one do with that piece of knowledge?

We have had these notices before… “The school is informed by the Electrical Company that there will be a power outage on Friday, May 3 from 7am to 4pm. If you bring your own lunch, please make sure that it does not need heating up as the microwave will not work.”Not to worry, I teach technology, how could having no electricity affect me? I have two teaching areas; one is in the basement with no windows and that is our video/film studio/area, the other is my fishbowl; so anyone strolling the halls sees everything and anyone from the library can wave to my kids as they do.

Not to worry, lots of glass plus the windows to outside overlooking just another China construction site with a dozen cranes and lots of people scurrying about to keep us entertained when I have lost the plot. But with no electricity one realizes how dark it still is even surrounded by glass. Computer class was no problem; we just used the new Intel Zen Ultrabooks from the computer carts which had been charged up. They were not able to save to their folders on the intranet but we had a good session with Adobe Fireworks, InDesign and Photoshop and hopefully they will remember what we did by next class. Of course middle school students at the start of spring… maybe not. My basement area was not useable. It reminded me of when photography was more fun when film processing was done in the darkroom. My video area surely is dark enough but I doubt the equipment is even available to develop film anymore.

I went to for a semester in 1969 and took courses in photography. It was such a disjointed time in my life; living with Carol Ann and her one year old daughter, Desiree (who now is 45), a friend on Facebook living in Colorado now. Back in 1969 we barely knew the day of the week but I did get to my photography classes.

Along the Oregon Coast 1969

Then before the end of the year we ended up in Hawaii in a cult religious order

Brother Arthur Adsit (they changed my first name and I changed my last name in 1980) in the Holy Order of Mans; Wichita Kansas – 1974

and I somehow got myself a job in a photography studio in Honolulu. I got back into photography and darkroom development toward the end of the 1970s in and used my work as part of my picture poem art which I exhibited in various art shows 1977 – 1979. Part of teaching photography should involve developing film in a darkroom but I doubt that will ever happen again.

So we were told that at four pm we would have electricity. Last year this happened too and it did go back on. At four pm the electricity did not come on and when it became too dark to see and there was nothing much to eat and all we have is an electric stove and appliances we asked others, now flushed out into the hall, what their dinner situation was. Folks over at the other apartment complex have gas stoves which lead us to Jean and Sean’s. With candlelight and a gas stove. The electricity did come on for ten minutes and that was it. I made a large pot of spaghetti then Narda and I found our way home in the dark. At about 4 AM the electricity was back on which lacks in excitement when sleep seems to be the only option, however, it was short lived and went off until 7.

Below is the guard station to Dalian American International School from our balcony with no electricity

Looking from our balcony toward our neighbours who obviously had more candles than we did with a the electricity over and out.

There were a couple of flickers of off and on but Narda had time to Google+ chat her sons and granddaughter between Australia and Atlanta Georgia. The one in India must have been in between online moments so he did not make it to the ‘hangout’.

We missed the shopping bus and took the light rail into Kaifaqu ( 开发区 ) eating some good Western tucker at Tarsa in Five Colour City (our video of it last year). Expats, especially the young ones like

Five Colour City but we find it run down, seedy, past its whatever-it-was-meant to be heyday, though it is where we buy Western food stuff at Harbour View and purchase stuff for our non-Chinese brains. I read this review of the place recently which sums it up quite well: “There is nothing quite like Five Color City. It’s as if a group of first grade students designed the buildings in crayon for a classroom art project”. [http://www.whatsondalian.com/guide-74-rise-and-fall-of-five-color-city-in-dalian.html].

At the teacher’s get together pot-luck meals tonight – with a day of electricity under our belts the talk was that someone got the wires crossed. OK where did they get their electrician degree from? It was a highly inconvenient stuff-up but as always we enjoyed the moments. I made tofu burger balls, what I usually bring as my contribution and they all got eaten so that is good. I just cooked up a couple cups of black rice, added couple of cups of peanuts, carrots, onions, tofu, spices, flour and deep fried small balls in olive oil. I bring them to each hall party/apartment pot-luck/ and wherever else we end up eating in groups. I used to make them in my tofu factory thirty years ago and took them to barbeques in Australia so my life really does not change in so many ways.

On my bike ride this morning I took photos of a sign that points visitors, hopefully not angry government officials from our neighbours up the road (North Korea – 200 kilometer highway hike or a boat ride away) to where we live and work. Not sure where they got their info from but I found two glaring things for those Chinese Government officials who are readers of my blog to think about the next time they take an English writing course then proceed to put up a sign: Dalian Amerircan Lnternational School – OK OK it is just point to a school – no need to do a spell check and they even have a map showing how to get to who they think we are,

the local sign pointing to our school with another China spelling idea of the way it is

Actually we are not the United States of America School – come on mate that is making us into a big target. We are all from many different countries; actually I am from a country called Terrell so surely I am not one to reckon with.

Not to be picky but Bondeaux Wine Manor? Really this is not a wine growing area, of course it is another miss-spelt word the signs on the “manor” is “Chateau De Bourdeux” (our video of this development last year which has gone heaps further now) which is just a strange housing sale office. See http://bordeaux-undiscovered.co.uk/blog/2012/09/moving-bordeaux-to-china/ We have done the tour and found it quite enjoyable in a humorous way. This strange structure is across the street from us and they are building 800 homes like it. What is most fascinating is the workers who are from various parts of China and are itinerant workers who find us Western living in their midst quite amusing too. We pass them on our morning walks to the beach and we all have the giggle toward one another. Below is a photo from our balcony.

And yes it is not blue burry valley as it says on the sign above. It is Blueberry Valley with a lovely restaurant at the top of the hill where we use to go last year on Friday’s after school. This school year we have not gone there though I am not sure why. The mix of teachers who come and leave changes a lot each year and the previous mix as well as a lot of us first year here teachers clumped together heaps. This school year we all seem to go to place on our own and the social setting is quite different.

I found one of my dozens of domains information a few hours ago. I suppose when someone makes a webpage they hope not to be in last place and I guess I am not with billions of webpages out there but as a Leo (Sun, Mercury, Venus and that awful Saturn and Pluto exact conjunction in Leo all in my 10th house – what the hell happend?) I was hoping for a higher ranking than 6,298,119, meaning six million and two hundred ninety eight plus sites are in better position than mine. Maybe it is my colour scheme or lack of sense, a flair for a random artistic flavor that I have always championed going through life. Being popular when there are 7 or 8 billion people is difficult though I think I am ahead of a few billion but I do not know if that is very good.

Neuage.org created in 24/04/2003 (what is not noted is that my first neuage.org site was made ten years earlier in 1992 – two years after the WWW was invented and at that time I was ahead of the curve) and owned byTerrell Neuage. Neuage.orgtakes 6298119thposition in global internet… with159 estimated visits per day.

I even have a QR reader on their page leading to my site – try it.

We had one of our evening together dinners last night, a celebration of warmer times, at least from a weather perspective. Yesterday was the first time since last October – seven months ago, that we were out and about without jumpers, a tee-shirt day. Today it is 23 (centigrade) so it is bike-riding long-distance time again. I want to go where they are building the new city about half an hour away [Newly Buried Villages of China] .

Here is a photo from my balcony looking at where we had dinner last night; I asked about it and the story is that our librarian came across this and others like it in a field went and got the school van and driver and took them to her house. We live near an art school so I would assume it was probably an installation from artists and they probably wonder who stole their art. I use to do art installations – hanging pictures amongst trees as a show and would have been shocked to find them missing. I did a series of clothing that I dipped in plaster of paris and when dried I sprayed painted and wrote poems on them and hung them in a park in the centre of Adelaide and no one took them. I did this once with a dress from a girlfriend and hung in a tree in front of the art school in Adelaide and it lasted a couple of weeks before disappearing. Now that the librarian is leaving she gave these paper machete figures away with this one landing on the porch of our neighbor across the way. I call it ‘caged thievery’.

caged thievery’

An evening without electricity and candles make any mood just so good.

Sunday morning, wanting to write up what is a bit of a big thing in my small world and definitely may bring some closure but of course never full closure as it shouldn’t to my meandering through this life or at least one significant aspect to it but after one paragraph we were off to Long Shan Village which consists really of only a couple of streets with commerce and is a ten minute bike ride away.

Long Shan Village

This is our favourite shopping area as it is so local and of course cheap, much cheaper than going to nearby Jinshitan or taking the shopping bus from Campus Village as we did yesterday into Kaifaqu, the centre of the DDA (Dalian Development Area) where our veggies at the green door (our name for it as we have no idea what the lettering in front says and of course we would not be able to say it if we did know) cost twice as much as at Long Shan – see Narda below buying the week’s fruit…

Long Shan Village

The destination was our local stationary store to get bits of pieces we both needed for school. Narda got three pairs of Crocs for 20 RMB a bit over three US dollars, not needed for school but cheap shoes and a woman… Imitations? Who cares? What strikes me as a fun shop that would not be in Australia or the States is that at this shop one could buy pens, paper, computer bits and pieces; I got a laser pointer light for my classroom and a bag to put camera equipment in. Narda got some more notebooks with some strange English-like sentences, three pairs of Crocs, shoelaces; and one could also buy strong alcohol which sits on the same shelf as plastic toys but the best of all is on the way out one could buy an ice cream and fireworks. We stopped and looked at the firework rockets and the shop keeper waved her arms and said ‘booom’ and laughed but we gave it a miss this time – see below…

I first heard of Facebook when I was teaching a speech class at the State University of New York in Albany. Students were presenting speeches about something that was new and interesting in their lives and one student had just been invited to join Facebook which at that time no one else in the class had heard of it. This was about 2005 and so we all became her friends. It seems so long ago when there were only a few college students in Facebook – joining other students in Boston. I still have that account but as I no longer have my university email I do not use it. A year later I made a Facebook page for my son who had decided to leave his life behind; he was a pitcher for the LA Dodgers living in the States when he left the Dodgers in Florida, not telling anyone (they looked all over for him as they were concerned about his mental well-being that week – they said) on August 13th due to a quarrel with his girlfriend who was appearing in the Australian Idol series in Sydney.

When Leigh was 16 he was clocked at 91 mph by an Atlanta scout; more scouts followed. He was courted by Atlanta, Minnesota, and Arizona as well as the Dodgers. I wanted him to go to Arizona as I liked their youth program but at 17 he signed with LA and that was it.

He arrived in Sydney after the 20 hour trip from Florida (I still have his return ticket) spent a day with his girlfriend and booked the highest floor and went off the 15th story balcony of the Novotel Sydney Olympic Park Hotel. He was facing the baseball stadium where he had practiced with the Australian Olympic team for the upcoming Athens game. I went there for the first eight years after and left flowers where he died but I have not gotten to Sydney the past two years though for the tenth anniversary I plan to go this year.

I made a Facebook page for Leigh and a lot of his friends have written over the years, especially on his birthday – he has hundreds of friends.

In 1998, Leigh, playing for the Australian U 16 (he was 15) squad in a series inJohannesburg, South Africa, stayed with a family, as all the team did. In his belongings several years ago I found the address of the people he stayed with and wrote them. At some point when I was reading letters people had written in his Facebook Timeline I saw one from a girl who said she knew him from his stay in Johannesburg. I do not go to his page much these past few years but I thought I would check it a few days ago. It is difficult to see his friends living their life, most with children and know he should be there too – and be pitching in the major leagues. He worked so hard at it. When he was ten he use to tell people he would pitch for the New York Yankees one day and of course being the non-baseball country of Australia people would tell him he should play cricket or footy. We use to go out every morning before school and he would do a hundred pitches and again every day after school. Sacha use to join us for years but then he became more interested in basketball, then graffiti then rap and hip hop and now he is the alive and successful one living in Australia and Leigh is just a memory.

So back to Facebook; I saw this person from Johannesburg had written in Leigh’s Timeline that she had 6 letters each about nine pages long and if I wanted them I could send an address where to send them to. She had moved to Perth a few years ago and recently had these letters sent to her. Now she will be sending them to my in-laws in Adelaide and I will have them in August. I am so excited about this – to have something that my son wrote in the time before his death. All I have is a very long goodbye letter to his girlfriend and why he was going to leave his life. It is the saddest thing I have ever read. I may find these letters waiting for me just as sad but I hope not.

Years ago I even had a lot of Leigh’s Facebook friends playing Farmville with me. It started off with me playing Farmville and not having friends enough to give me gifts and Narda thought it was just silly so I created a bunch of accounts; dead people: Leigh, my brother, my father, mothers (being adopted I had two mothers, both dead, both Farmville friends), a couple of ex-girlfriends (being dead I suppose they are ex), a dog and a series of me (Farmer Terrell, Saint Terrell, Another Instance of Terrell, and etc.).

A couple of years ago I started an online project on with a professor from Singapore who was teaching in London and was looking at how people deal with death on-line. I lost contact with her in my past move to China and will just continue with my own research and project on dealing with death on-line.

Ah Tomb Sweeping Day, Qingming Festival;; the day that one tends the graves of their once-were-mates. One of those great non-Western holidays that we celebrate by not working, well working but not usual working, working in the plan-our-holidays way. The thing is about two and a half thousand years old and for the most part from what I see they do a few extra fireworks – a few extra – considering most mornings I hear fireworks from some local cemetery – a few extra gets to be a bit annoying when one wants to sleep in a bit. And they burn paper money though I am not sure what that is for. Nevertheless we jumped full throttle into the day; firstly, by changing our ticket back to Australia in July. Originally we had a six hour stop in Kuala Lumpur, on our ticket from Beijing to Adelaide after two weeks in the States. Today we changed that to four days in KL. The reason being that Narda has been looking for places we may retire to.

Somehow my mind disappears when I hear about retirement as my life I am doing sort of backward. I started my university career as a student at the age of 44 and continued it for 14 more years in the midst of being a single parent in the middle of a foreign country trying not to be foreign to myself but I may have failed and just ended up re-inventing myself as an old person. I started to teach at uni in 1998 whilst doing my seven year trek through the brain-numbing, though at times, interesting, world of a PhD, at the University of South Australia – age 51 – when some start thinking of retirement I started thinking what I would do when I grew up and finished my bloody thesis http://neuage.org/ODAM. I liked my world – the kids would go to Wirreanda High School in Morphett Vale for the day and I would take the train into Adelaide and spend the day in my office. It was an escape back when the Internet and making webpages was fun before the world was swamped with so much instant changes and so much information. I went slower in those days; fifteen years ago when I was only 51 I went at a much slower pace than now, probably enjoyed life much more, and definitely accomplished more in a day. I could teach classes, work on my thesis, and have time to be a parent, write children stories, do my picture poems, be on a basketball and a baseball team with my children and oh so much more.

I loved being a single parent and would recommend it to anyone if not everyone. We roamed the world; doing a couple of round-the-world trips, we dreamt of incredible futures – which almost eventuated and life was good. Life is still good but I felt I was more retired when I was in my 40s being a single parent, dreaming impossible dreams and just chilling. Now I have embraced adulthood – even must say it is quite enjoyable – I am just getting going and retirement? Nay, it’s not for me. But Narda, she is looking at the beaches, and grandchildren, and travel as if three trips to Australia and a trip to the States as well as other local spots: Viet Nam, various Chinese cities, in a year is not enough. One of the places that Narda has been reading about is Penang, Malaysia so we are looking for places to stay in George Town, an hour flight away from Kuala Lumpur. Four days in Penang and no doubt I will be shown the merits of retirement.

Actually I equate Tomb Sweeping Day with retirement. What I did get done on this glorious holiday was putting together my vast number of video clips from last week’s pop into Shanghai and distilling them down to two three minute clips. They are now youtube videos: http://youtu.be/KzbtUqU7Qcs = Shanghai, and http://youtu.be/FgWA_yne1VI = Zhujiajiao, as well I have made them additions to my blog for those two events: http://neuage.us/BLOGS/39-Shanghai2013.htm for my two blog readers in all of China and whom may not be able to get on to youtube due to not having a VPN. What we should have done today was ride out bikes but it is still cold and windy and well we tried a mini-retirement day. I even stayed in my jammies for most of the day and took a fifteen minute nap and now I will toddle off to the gym and work on body sculpturing or keeping the fat bits away anyway. I suppose if retirement was like today it was OK though I am really looking forward to tomorrow to go back to work.

I have my film class first block; 8:45 in the morning and we are finishing up quarter number three. We are Skyping with people in India and a person in the State of Washington who has written an orchestra piece that our school is performing. As well we are preparing our Skype work with a co-producer in LA who has recently had her film in the Sundance Festival and she is working with my class to do a film online. So retirement? Not this week mate. I love my job – I have so many projects going at once and rush from thing to thing, reminding me of decades ago when I lived a project-based life and in the midst had time to laugh with my children and dream incredible futures. That is what I love about my job; I not only can accomplish stuff I need as well as want to do but I have lots of flexibility to try new things and get involved in new directions. And now at 65 when others think of retirement I have started a new career as a film dude as I am getting involved in a kool global niche of creative possibilities I had not dreamt of even last semester.

Oh Narda has just found a caravan for us to purchase – another retirement plan of hers. We will have a caravan in Australia and live in it when we visit family when we are not cruising the Nile or trekking Nepal or whatever it is old people do that have money – well that is not us, too ugly and too poor maybe but not ones with money so maybe we will just buy an old caravan – tie it up to our old car that sits in storage in Australia – and become trailer trash and get fat and live along the coast of Australia. Every day will then be Tomb Sweeping Day.

Another conference now history another system of notes to integrate into my life another direction to life; all for the forward thrust of evolution for those who come next; the children so I am told. I have been to conferences. Mostly in New York (the best being NAIS’ ‘New York State Association of Independent Schools’ in MohonkattheMountainHouse – in New Paltz in the Catskills) – and recently in Asia: Bangkok, Shanghai (twice), Shenzhen… well that is all. The Asian ones are quite different in that the term networking is overused and really means ‘is your school better than mine and if so can I get a job there?’ In Australia or the States with unions and accountability and ethics in schools conferences really are about listening to new information or in my situation as technology dude, learning about new programs. One learns about another person’s school not because they want to leave their current school post-haste but because they are genuinely interested in how another school runs, especially in their topic. I am always surprised at how many people are disgruntled with their school and it is always the same complaints which centre around administration. Stuff that would never happen overseas happens with reckless abandon in Asia where teachers report micromanaged lives to the point of dictatorship. I try to avoid the tales of woe and for the most part did.

This was a great conference for me for the very reason a conference should be great for anyone. I met three great dudes that are doing wonderful things with film – my new baby. The best, for me, workshops were the ones centred on film. Breen O’Reilly, from Beijing International School, and David Gran from Shanghai International presented Asia through film; http://asiathroughfilm.wikispaces.com/ The trick will be to find the same films with English subtitles – they exist because the clips that Breen and David showed had subtitles. What I will miss will be all their narratives about the films and the directors of them. One movie in particular will be my first target to find is “Mardi Gras: Made in China” (2005). The writer, David Redmon wondered where the Mardi Gras doubloons came from – well we all know that don’t we? So he went and investigated and found a factory in China where they were made. The people at the factory had no idea who would want such things. I am really into this as I lived through several Mardi Gras in New Orleans and I have a large poster from 1978 –made by a friend and I have had this on my wall in many homes in many cities and three countries (Australia, China, USA) over the past 35 years. Here it is on my wall in Dalian, China. I collect things from my past – my wife says ‘hordes’ things from my past and yes I still have two of those made in China’ Mardi Gras coins – that I have in my wallet some 35 years later. Gosh.

Apparently ‘Made in China’ was made with one camera and done in imovie – the poster below is from Wikipedia

David Gran introduced and showed clips from the EARCOS Shanghai Asia Film Festival http://www.shanghaifilmfest.org/. I was lucky to spend lots of time with him; Breen O’Reilly and Joshua Sternlicht at this conference which I hopefully will be able to work with in the future to kick start our film courses in Dalian American International School.

My synchronous moment of Saturday, the last day of the conference was sitting at a table with two others at a film workshop. One is from Albany NY – wife to David Gran and the other, Joshua Sternlicht, from Schenectady NY, the filmmaker now at the International School of Manila – two towns next to where I grew up – we all went to neighbouring schools – and we are all doing film at our schools; one teaching in Manila, one in Shanghai and me up north where it is still cold and we are going back to in a couple of hours. Maybe I should make a film of this… or is it just four planets in Aries now and Saturn in 13 Scorpio exactly square my Pluto/Saturn conjunction; a waxing square. And true enough projects I started on at my Saturn return seven years ago are changing now just like it is said in astrology. Yesterday I walked into a class door and almost knocked myself out – luckily I don’t believe in astrology or I would say there was linkage. Speaking of which, I was an astrologer for 40 years and even met my first wife on an astrological trip to New Zealand and Australia in 1980 – I was living in Baltimore at the time. I stopped astrology in 2003 due to events in my life (Leigh) but for whatever reason I downloaded the app ‘Celeste’ onto my iphone. It does a complete chart. This is something I wish I had back in the 1960s – 2000. I use to do charts all the time for everything but always using an ephemeris and by hand. This is so instant I can always know where everything is. Not that I care anymore but the planets positions for when I walked into a glass window really did explain it –every planets relationship to my natal chart said ‘you will walk into a glass window’ – damn. No wonder I don’t want to see this – especially after the fact.

A few weeks past which is what happens when life is full to live and there is no time to pause and reflect – maybe today I can get back on track…

February 22 – 24

Shenzhen for a weekend a few weekends ago; other cities always look so great; Shenzhen is best. We had a two-bedroom, three-bathroom apartment for two nights with a balcony opening from each bedroom and the living room on the 15th floor with view of Hong Kong Harbour and Hong Kong.

Fraser Place Apartments Shekou. Shenzhen

In China it is not being where you have gone to but getting there that is the amazing experience. I am more surprised by the fact that we arrived at our destination in one-piece than anything else. Our taxi driver from the Shenzhen Bao’an International Airport (深圳宝安国际机场; formerly named Shenzhen Huangtian Airport) not only drove at the highest speed his wobbly rusty cab could go, weaving in and out of traffic, beeping his horn the whole way – ‘out of my path got Westerners on board’ but he blinked his high-beam lights all the way. We would get really close to someone’s bumper and he would flash his high-beam on and off and beep then swerve around them. Luckily for all of us it was only a 45 minute ride of terror. I suppose in my younger years instead of going to a theme park and riding a terrifying ride I would have just gone to China and grabbed a taxi for a death-defying thrill. We have only had one close accident – well every time getting in to a car in China is close to an accident – we had the bonnet or hood (depending which country you associate the front of the car with) come up and break the window but that one time the driver was actually going close to the speed limit and there was no one in front of us to smash into. We had our bit of a scrape last July on the interstate in Mississippi in the US of A when at 70 mph a truck sideswiped us sending us across a four lane busy highway see http://neuage.me/2013/02/01/a-piggly-wiggly-story/ but in China it is always like this driver is going to kill us. But as one would have suspected by now – he didn’t.

Traveling with Narda one realizes comfort is number one. Most places we seem to change rooms. In Hoain, Viet Nam we changed after one night, too close to the road, OK so the new apartment was a good place for a week. In Hanoi a couple of months ago we lasted one hour before Narda was at the front desk getting us a room change – forget why now.

Ming Hua ship in Shekou, Shenzhen;

(In 1962 France launched a ship named Ancerville, which was purchased by the People’s Republic of China in 1973 and renamed Minghua. 10 years later the ship was permanently berthed at Shekou, Shenzhen, where she was refurbished and rebranded – this time as the hotel and entertainment complex, “Shekou Sea World. The Minghua was berthed at Sea World Plaza, the water which originally surrounded her has been reclaimed to allow construction of a golf course. The land reclamation continued southward, and today the coastline has been moved several hundred metres, leaving the Minghua completely landlocked.)

We arrived at the Frazier Centre at midnight and took a strong sleeping pill so nothing would disturb us, went to bed and damn it was a Chinese bed – might as well as sleep on the floor. Once; on a weekend rafting trip, we took a pillow top mattress with us, rolled tightly and stored in the bus cargo area. That was a worthwhile decision as the typical Chinese bed was rock hard.

I was tired enough to sleep on the floor if not the bed but Narda was already half out the door saying we needed to get a different room. Not to argue I opened the door and watched her rush off to the elevator.

Ten minutes later she returned; bellboy in tow carrying a large pillow top mattress; we did have a king size bed. Together they made up the bed which was a bit funny as Narda and I were feeling the effect of our sleeping pill, and we no surely most have appeared rather drunk. Nevertheless we woke the next morning, a good six hours later, with some I disturbed sleep behind us. As usual, Narda was right getting us more comfortable.

We got to Campus Village a couple of years ago at two AM where we still live, though of course we have moved apartments since then only to discover our bed was hard. Fortunately Nard saw a pillow top mattress in a storage room the very next day and soon the security guards were lugging it to our apartment. Since then we have purchased another mattress to add to it sows have a pretty good bed by now. Not that I Am suggesting a pattern here but that first week Narda moved her classroom too; understandable as the room assigned her was not really suitable. If only others would realize what I did years ago; she is often right and the best judge of what we should have so do it right from the get go and let the good times roll.

We had our weekend workshop at Shekhou International School in the Shekhou area of Shenzhen, a five minute walk from the Frazier Apartments with now a rather soft bed.

We were at an ipad work shop which is good in itself but we are a PC school and I was told not only would our school never have macs installed but that we would never have ipad support but here there are four of us keeping up with integrating technology in education despite administration. Because the most important basis to education is to provide tools for 21st century learning and at the present time the ipad is the best resource available to students. Many of our students use macs and iPads and instead of trying to hide from this fact I want to have the knowledge to support their learning which is why the other three teachers from our school were there.

Narda’s fellow music teacher uses his ipad in all his classes and so did our previous music teacher who left to teach at a progressive international school in the Middle East. Narda was reluctant to get an ipad but by the end of the weekend she loves it and will be making good use of it. I personally do not have a great desire for it as I make webpages, program with Flash and create videos and newscast which I use my laptop for and will for some time. At the moment I am writing this on my iPhone using Pages which Narda downloaded yesterday onto her ipad which downloaded to my phone as we share our apps account whilst flying.

Not sure why they have statues coming out of buildings but in Shenzhen they do.

OK a couple of weeks later and the iPad is in the drawer. We have given up trying to get Ted Talks with the Internet speed here; even leaving it on overnight does not produce results. But we will re-visit it soon.

The International School of Beijing (ISB) like Shekou International School is a beautiful school. SIS has three campuses and we were at the elementary one whereas ISB is one large campus with 1700 or so students K – 12. I went to see the video/film program as I am putting together one at our school. Not much to say except it would be a great place to work. Beijing as always was quite polluted. I got the app for my iPhone ‘China Air Quality’ which was probably a bad idea as I am a bit obsessed with it keeping track of my local town of Dalian. Today Dalian is ‘slightly polluted’ at 106 and at the moment Beijing is 398 (‘very unhealthy, protection recommended). When I was there it was about 450 – choke choke, and there was a time last month when it was off the chart at close to a thousand. Shanghai, where we are spending next week is either 133 or 68. On this app there are two readings for most cities. One is from the US Consulate – 133 for Shanghai the other, 68, from the Chinese, so one can follow which ever. I tend to believe the Yanks – not sure why.

Shenzhen-sunset

ISB is outside of downtown but the pollution is still evident. When I was there a soccer tournament was underway and I couldn’t help wonder why people would pay so much money to have their kids at a top school but where the air is so unhealthy and with them running around gasping for air and kicking balls.

I collected information on their film/video program but with them having about ten times the budget I have, even with a recent healthy grant to get some equipment, I will not be competing well in any film shows these next few years. They had a wall of trophies and plaques for competitions they have won in the Asia arena.

Spent today planning trips for school break mid-June – first days of August; New York, Atlanta, maybe a week in Florida and three weeks in Australia. Just some more stuff to add to my travel pages; http://neuage.us/2013/

We left our Hanoi hotel at 5:30 AM; similar time that we got there a few days earlier after the train from Sapa tossed us out onto the payment of Hanoi. And at the airport @ 6:30ish then landing in Guangzhou, China time, at 11ish. We did not have a flight until 8 PM so we took the subway (metro) to downtown, found some Western food, and walked, once again, way too much.

A hotel lobby dude at a hotel told us that there was a bus to the airport and we went off to a tall building he pointed to that looked close but it took us 45 minutes of walking before it finally popped up in front of us. It is like walking to the Eiffel tower; only seems a few blocks away and the more you walk the longer it takes to get to it. To cut a nonsensical story short we took the airport bus back which was a lot better than being in a subway and it took less time, about 45 minutes.

So China again. After Vietnam the contrast is startling. China the any-brand-knock-off; Ikea personified land of imitation. Vietnam; Sapa, Hoian, Hanoi the places we spent the past three weeks in, with so much richness of life. And the food is OK; baguettes and well prepared fruit dishes. Thank the French for their occupation to give a country some class. A few hours in Guangzhou and the land of shopping malls and cheap copies leap out to strangle any possible creative and originality left of its population. What has happened to you China? All those inventions and culture you once produced reduced to copycats.

But . We are back home, in our adopted country, and it feels good to be headed back to our apartment with all our crap there as well as a cupboard of my belongs at school and shelves of my things in the computer lab: my PhD thesis, National Geographic books from the 1920s  1940s my father had collected, some antique cameras, a boomerang, posters, a 500 page novel I wrote, Leaving Australia and other assorted things. We have stuff all over the place from a shed of stuff in upstate New York to our furniture in our Jersey City home and a shed of our belongings in the Adelaide Hills, South Australia as well as boxes of our stuff in storage at Nardas sister and at her parents. And now we have about a suitcase of new stuff and a suitcase and a half of our clothing in storage on this plane. I like the Buddhist ideals of not wanting things, of living in the moment, of respecting all life (well at least I do that by not eating animals) but I reckon there is a way to go before I can say I am a Buddhist. Firstly we need to shed four houses; three in the States and one in Australia that we no longer want or can afford. We should shove all of them over the fiscal cliff. Of course the good thing about traveling is that we have seen almost no news for three weeks so perhaps the world did end on 21 December though after seeing 22-million Chinese today I doubt that and maybe the States did go over their cliff who knows? Does anyone really care? What was so good about the village people back in Sapa is that they just live day to day pretty much the same as they have for the past thousand years. Take away CNN and BBC and the ABC (Australian Broadcast Corporation) and etc. and stay clear of newspapers  easy to do when there are not any around in English, and the world is such a nice place. When we retire we will not watch the news anymore or read about the nonsense in the rest of the world and wherever we are will be just our grand life in our everyday grand adventure of living life to the fullest.

Four days before being back at work. I suppose I have lots to do to be ready for classes; lessons to write, ties to sort out to wear I bought four more on this trip so now I have more than a hundred ties from around the world; not boring basic business ties but unique, usually from thrift shops  my favourite place to get ties; they are there because others didnt want them because they were too different to wear but I wear them. I got my newly self-designed shirt I had made in Hoian and so much more.

China below Guangzhou today

Vietnam below  which has more soul?

In less than a month we will be off again  to Australia for a week  Chinese New Years week and this will probably be my last blog about travel until then. Probably including then too because what could I possibly blog about Australia? I will visit my son in Melbourne and that is great but not something I normally blog about though I did mention him in a blog when he visited us a few months ago here in China, that was special. We are going to Nardas granddaughters Christening and her son turning 30 party but that is for her to blog about. She blogs but it is on paper in her scrapbook with tickets and stuff from places we went; much better than my blogs, more interesting and intelligent writing but I am only the other one who reads them. Then again I get about two or three hits to my blogs; no doubt all three from Chinese censors and I really just write for myself to remember what we did.

What I am looking forward to the most these next four days before returning to work is working on my videos. I have so many from the past three weeks and aside of I didnt take my computer on this trip and Narda doesnt have a program that I can use with my camera, besides there has not been time to go through a hundred if not hundreds of short clips to make about four five  seven minute movies to put on youtube and etc. I have more than 400 videos online from the past ten years so a few more will get me caught up to date with our travels. Plus I want to make webpages for this trip and they will be linked from http://neuage.us/2012/Vietnam

What I will think about in the future when I am being told my lesson plans are not quite to the American Standards (yes those standards that keep America in about 25th place in education in the world) that our school is so obsessed about is not the next lesson plan or lesson unit that a principal or two are demanding but of walks with tribal people in their villages outside of Sapa. That is what is important in life  to have been exposed to people who live wholesome lives who are not grabbing at material possessions and soulless educational expectations. The children we met were happy, learning, holistic and so full of enthusiasm unlike the children we teach who spend days and nights hunched over computers memorizing facts for the next test and who lose all sense of creativity because they have no concept how to apply learning to life only to tests.

But it is all good life is good and I am happy that at 65 and close to retirement that I am once again reminded of the wholesomeness of life and that simplicity really is what is complicated at achieving. I lived this way in the 1960s, living in communes in California, Oregon and Hawaii and no doubt in the future Narda and I will be living in some village in Cambodia, India, Vietnam, Thailand or in South America with all our belongings that we have collected in the rubbish dump and all that we will have will be each other and our most basic items to survive then we will have arrived at freedom and correct living.

Writing this on China Southern flight Guangzhou to Dalian with too little sleep to stay awake much longer but there is still an hour left of this bloody flight and Narda has been asleep for the past two hours lucky her but I have four days in front of me to sleep and make video clips . Yippee.

Thursday morning the third of January  some sleep and looking out the window  damn where did the warm weather go? Jack, our driver  the real Jack  not one of his mates – as usual, was waiting for us at the airport in Dalian and drove us the one hour ride home getting us back to Campus Village at midnight. It is so nice to be home; the maids cleaned the apartment and did our laundry whilst we were gone and I just dropped out a lot of laundry to do.

Turned on the news after three weeks and righto the world did not end, the Yanks shoved everything back up on to the cliff and we even made a ten-percent increase overnight on our Chase stocks. Life is good.